"Sabbath"

"I’m six or seven and dreaming that I am a boy," says Norwegian singer-songwriter Jenny Hval in the opening seconds of "Sabbath". Her voice is nimble over a knocking drum loop, leading us into "Sabbath"’s inward-facing and unfamiliar dream world, with Hval’s bracing stream of consciousness guiding the way.

Although "Sabbath" expands on an actual dream Hval had as a child ("When I was really young, I had a dream that my vagina had braces," she’s said of the song’s surreal origins), the track itself is patently awake. "Sabbath" is intense and erotic and exigent, a disorienting song in which dogs are wolves, rocks are cliffs, boys are girls and girls are horses. The galloping drum that propels "Sabbath" figures most prominently when Hval’s lyrics take a more sinister turn: "Some days I feel like my body is straightened, held up by thin braces," she speak-sings. "I can feel myself from above but I can’t see who’s holding them." It suggests being at the mercy of another, but Hval knows better: "It would be easy to think about submission, but I don’t think it’s about submission," she sings. "It’s about holding, and being held."

Speaking about "Sabbath", Hval said that though the song opens with a dream of being male, it is "very much about girls… playing, dreaming, singing, transforming. Girls speaking to and for everyone." A powerfully female reverie manifests on "Sabbath", sustaining the song, leaving preconceived notions of the body, sex, dreams, and desire to rot in Hval's wake.